A major part of the fast food and retail food markets is allocated to pizzas. On average over three billion pizzas are sold in the United States alone, of which 50% are take out. Millions of pizza boxes are therefore used to transport these take-out pizzas. Pizza boxes are well known and come in various shapes and sizes. While most boxes are square, it is known to have hexagonal, octagonal, circular and rectangular shaped boxes.
Pizza boxes are usually made out of corrugated cardboard or fiberboard and have a base and a lid. The base has a periphery with side walls extending vertically upward when the base is in an upright position. Similarly, the lid has a periphery with side walls extending vertically downward. Usually, the lid fits over the base and the base and the lid are hingedly connected to one another. In some pizza boxes, the base and lid are two separate pieces. The lid and base usually fit snugly relative to one another to keep the pizza as hot as possible. Due to the size of the traditional pizza box, pizza boxes are not easy to discard. As such, the user must some how break down or flatten the box to a size that allows the pizza box to be recycled.
In general, pizza is eaten in an informal manner. More specifically, pizza can be messy due to the ingredients and can be dangerous if still hot and not handled appropriately. To overcome the issues of temperature and neatness, the pizza can be distributed onto plates using utensils, which require cleaning after consumption of the pizza or one can use disposal plates, which add to the resulting garbage. Furthermore, some disposable plates are not rigid enough to support a piece of pizza. When plates are not readily available, the user is required to hold the pieces of pizza in their hands if the pizza is not too hot.
Prior art inventions have tried to address some of the aforenoted issues. U.S. Pat. No. 5,110,038 issued May 5, 1992 to Pantisano et al. discloses a plate forming and breakdown pizza box. The invention discloses a standard corrugated paper pizza box in a shape to form four circular serving plates with a beveled raised edge and cross slit cuts through the bottom panel of the pizza box separating the box into four essentially equal portion for easy disposal.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,476,214 issued Dec. 19, 1995 to Fisk Jr. for a pizza box with wedge-shaped break-down spatula plates. These plates can be separated from the box and more specifically the lid, and then used to lift out individual slices of pizza. The pizza slice resting on the plate can be picked up cleanly and safely ready to eat.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,014,853 issued May 14, 1991 to Crockett for a food delivery box. This invention relates to a pizza box that can be separated into sections that form plates on which the pizza can be eaten. Specifically, the top portion of the box is perforated from substantially central to the top portion through the flaps to define sections or plates.
Although the prior art addresses some of the issues surrounding breaking a pizza box into plates, the prior art does not specifically define a pizza box that allows the user to separate the pizza box lid into plates, that is configured for easy, flexible, gripping by a user to protect the user from the temperature of the pizza and is also configured specifically for urging users to grasp with either a right hand or left hand.